A methodically told story of longing and belonging.
A movie star returns to her hometown and realizes her feelings for her high school friend are more romantic than platonic.
At 31, Katie Price has won every acting award Hollywood has to offer and is looking to make her move into directing. Desperate for some downtime to work on a script she’s adapting, she heads home to Green Bay, Wisconsin, to spend Christmas with her parents. While there, she sees her high school best friend, Wil Greene. Wil deferred law school and stayed in Green Bay after her father’s death, and instead of returning to academia, she’s found satisfying work as an insurance adjuster. In the past year, she’s become famous for a TikTok channel where she kisses strangers, a sexy and insightful exploration of intimacy in the age of social media. When Wil and Katie see each other at a Christmas party, they instantly fall back into their old friendship like no time has passed, even resuming their teenage investigation into the personal life of their least favorite teacher. Wil and Katie slowly realize that their strong bond was actually romantic attraction, and they inch toward declaring their love for each other. The novel is beautifully written, exploring Wil and Katie’s evolution from friends to lovers as twin journeys of self-awareness. Katie’s reputation has been tainted and smeared in the press by an abusive ex-boyfriend for the past decade, and she’s wary of pulling Wil into the media maelstrom that is her life. Wil realizes she’s been hiding in Green Bay, afraid to take emotional risks after losing her dad. They’ve been friends for a lifetime, but only now do they know themselves well enough to understand they were in love all along.
A methodically told story of longing and belonging.Pub Date: June 11, 2024
ISBN: 9781250894687
Page Count: 368
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
A romance that could have used significant rethinking.
Childhood friends, almost-sweethearts, a misunderstanding, and a funeral.
Blair Lang and Declan Renshaw were best friends who went on one date before a disagreement and an accident sent them in different directions after high school. Now Blair is back from college to be with her great-aunt Lottie, who’s dying, and to support her single mother in small-town Seabrook, California. Finding a job at a coffee shop puts her in the path of her former boyfriend, since he turns out to be its owner. Can the two get past their mistakes? The novel uses the popular second-chance romance trope, but Pham fails to energize it through interesting characters. Blair’s grief over her great-aunt’s death and her plan to help her mother are overshadowed by internal monologues about her feelings, the way her friends aren’t paying attention to her, and the novel she plans to write. Declan’s distinguishing characteristic, besides being a former high school quarterback, is his skill at building birdhouses. Unsurprisingly, the couple doesn’t have much chemistry; when they embrace, their “bodies meld like…memory foam.” The wooden characters, unusual word choices (“conglomerate of pedestrians,” “litany of plants”), and odd turns of phrase (“tension melting from his eyebrows like butter melting in a warm pan”) are almost enough to obscure the lack of plot development. What passes for stakes is easily defused when Blair comes into an inheritance that saves her from working as a consultant at Ernst & Young in New York—so she can write a romance novel.
A romance that could have used significant rethinking.Pub Date: March 3, 2026
ISBN: 9781668095188
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2026
Two hot people confronting their trauma, making passionate love, and solving violent crimes! ’Nuff said.
A heartbroken man lusts after his therapist while seeking revenge on a drug kingpin and his enforcer.
Mitch Haskell’s wife, Angela, died two years ago of an apparent suicide, but Mitch has always believed the scene was staged. Certainly, she would never have willingly left their young son, Andrew, behind. Consumed with a thirst for vengeance, Mitch—a former Marine and undercover agent with the Drug Enforcement Administration and currently a police detective—is struggling with alcohol dependency and uncontrolled rage. Andrew is living with his in-laws, who are making not-so-subtle suggestions that they might apply for permanent guardianship if Mitch can’t get it together. So his boss and best friend, John Bowie, mandates that he go into therapy, which puts him in the path of sexy Dr. Dylan Reede. Within a few days, Mitch makes a connection between two new murders and the death of his former partner; finds a big clue that points to the truth about Angela’s death; goes undercover as a homeless man; takes on a vicious drug cartel; and obnoxiously bullies Dylan with a charm offensive that leads them inevitably to bed. While Mitch seems to lean into the stereotype of the ex-soldier/cop with deeply buried trauma who believes that the ends justify the means—at least in law enforcement—Dylan offers the strength and sweetness to help him start breaking down his walls, allowing herself to be vulnerable in turn. Is passionate sex enough to ground a relationship and a family for the long term? For these characters, and the breakneck speed of this thriller, it’s as good a foundation as any.
Two hot people confronting their trauma, making passionate love, and solving violent crimes! ’Nuff said.Pub Date: March 17, 2026
ISBN: 9781538743027
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Dec. 11, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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